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Reviews For: Cushcraft XM240 Big Thunder 40 meter Monoband

Category: Antennas: HF: Yagi, Quad, Rotary dipole, LPDA

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Review Summary For : Cushcraft XM240 Big Thunder 40 meter Monoband
Reviews: 14MSRP: 999.99
Description:
Cushcraft's XM240 monobander utilizes rugged Big Thunder hardware that combined with high strength aluminum tubing affords the antenna outstanding wind survivability. Phillystran boom trusses are used in the XM240 design for extra boom stability. The feed system is a 50 ohm direct feed with dual driven elements. VSWR is flat accross the band. A high power 1:1 balun is included.
Product is in production
More Info: http://www.cushcraftamateur.com
# last 180 days Avg. Rating last 180 days Total reviews Avg. overall rating
15144.1
VE4MM Rating: 2005-11-13
Excellent! Time Owned: 3 to 6 months.
Purchased new.

Mounted on a Roof-tower on roof up 30'

Easy to build, good quality and came with balun.

Performance is also GREAT!

Top Marks to Cushcraft!

Michael Mark, P.Eng., BSc EE, Life Member ARRL, VE4MM
W6DXO Rating: 2004-01-30
Excellent Value Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
After living with all manner of wire antennas for 40M I was fortunatre to get the XM240 up this month. Results so far have been excellent. What a difference!

My XM240 sits at 85' (13' above my SteppIR 3 element beam).

SWR is well within the published spec, and the F/B and forward gain numbers seem good as well.

I needed a relatively small footprint 40M beam that was reasonably priced and that would deliver--the XM240 fits the bill perfectly!

73, de harry, W6DXO
G4RCG Rating: 2003-12-23
Intermittant High SWR Time Owned: more than 12 months.
I have had the XM240 now for 3 years and its preformed great up until earlier this year when the swr started going crazy for no reason, put a bit of power throught the antenna and it seemed to "rf weld" the problem. After a lot of messing around changing the balun, renewing the pl259 connector,the coax to the switch box, stripping all the elemnets down and rebuilding it back up to find that the problem still existed. The only thing that I had not touched were the loading coils, these are "sealed" (not) with shrink wrap. So took the driven element apart again and looked at the wrap which appeared fine,I checked to see if there was continuaty between, there was not, so when I cut the wrap away from the coils and looked at the screw that holds the coil end onto the element it was covered in white corrosion, I cleaned all his away and made sure the electrical connection was good, now the antenna is working 100% again. I informed cushcraft who were pleased that I had told them of the problem,
KC2HZW Rating: 2003-07-10
Packs a Punch! Time Owned: 0 to 3 months.
After working 40M on a trap dipole, I purchased this antenna new. Construction is HEAVY duty, with triple walled elements and beautiful castings. This antenna should last a long time. It goes together quite quickly; a pair of sawhorses will make assembly easy. I spent a bit of time deburring the tubing, otherwise assembly was straight forward. A generous use of penetrox will make assembly a piece of cake and will make it much easier to take the antenna apart in the future should it be necessary. Naturally, this thing is pretty large so it goes without saying that several people will be needed to move it around. Planning first will save headaches!
Performance on the air is excellent. It seems to be pretty quiet and bandwidth is per Cushcraft specs with SWR less than 1.5:1. Front to back ratio is good for a 2 element beam. If you have the space this antenna is worth the price!